In 1927, interviewed for Vogue, Baker was reportedly “swathed in a full blue tulle frock with a bodice of blue snakeskin,” wearing an “enormous diamond ring with a very impressive diamond bracelet.

Nearly a century may have passed since that revolutionary dance, but its legacy remains as relevant as ever. And though, in later years, her banana skirts would transform from rubber fruits to a powerful, aggressive spike version, that initial design remains revolutionary. Growing up, she cleaned houses and babysat for the wealthy; one employer burned Baker’s hands as punishment for putting too much soap in the laundry. Baker’s arrival in Paris coincided with a newfound obsession with black culture, a generation of French men and women who collected African art, jazz, and danced the Charleston.

Offstage, Baker’s style grew ever more elaborate: Paul Poiret and Madeleine Vionnet, two of the leading couturiers in the ’20s, dressed Baker. The French government honored her with a 21-gun salute, making Josephine Baker the first American woman buried in France with full military honors. For baron and fashion photographer George Hoyningen-Huene, she posed nude, draped in a diaphanous veil.

With the profits, Baker moved into the Château des Milandes, a 24-room mansion in southwestern France; adopted 12 children from around the world; and kept a menagerie of exotic companions such as a cheetah named Chiquita. she remained a woman of the people, for the people: During World War II, Baker aided the French Resistance by smuggling secret messages in invisible ink on her musical sheets. In 1963, she was, notably, the only official female speaker to give an address at the March on Washington.Aside from these surface-level interests, there was a much deeper and disturbing fascination with the widely accepted belief in black people’s inherent primitiveness. The flasher banana is a hilarious choice for an adult party, but if you want to stay kid-friendly, check out our adorable baby bunting or banana in pajama costumes. The material on this site may not be reproduced, distributed, transmitted, cached or otherwise used, except with the prior written permission of Condé Nast. When she swung onstage in that fiercely swinging banana skirt in 1926, Baker brilliantly manipulated the white male imagination.

Use of this site constitutes acceptance of our User Agreement and Privacy Policy and Cookie Statement and Your California Privacy Rights. Vogue may earn a portion of sales from products that are purchased through our site as part of our Affiliate Partnerships with retailers. Styled as simple polyfoam tunics, slipping into one of these banana suits means you'll be plenty yellow in no time! Hordes of white Parisians flocked to the famed theater to see La Revue Nègre, a musical show that emerged from France due to the country’s fascination with jazz culture.

After she died on April 12, 1975, more than 20,000 people crowded the streets of Paris to watch the funeral procession on its way to L'Église de la Madeleine. The Spring 2011 Prada collection and most recently Marc Jacobs’s Fall 2016 runway notably referenced Baker’s signature gelled hair. And there, wearing little more than strings of pearls, wrist cuffs, and a skirt made of 16 rubber bananas, Josephine Baker descended from a palm tree onstage, and began to dance.